Scout who pressed senator about guns booted from den

When Ames Mayfield’s Cub Scout den met with a Colorado state senator last week, the 11-year-old came prepared with a long list of typed-up questions. He excitedly raised his hand to ask his first one.

Ames pressed Republican state Sen. Vicki Marble on an issue he knew was important to her: gun legislation. The Cub Scout in Broomfield, about 20 miles north of Denver, asked her a slew of questions about previous bills she had sponsored in support of the right to bear arms, and he wasn’t shy about inserting his opinion.

“I was shocked that you co-sponsored a bill to allow domestic violence offenders to continue to own a gun,” Ames said, according to a video posted to YouTube by his mother. “Why on Earth would you want someone who beats their wife to have access to a gun?”

After Ames’ questions went on for more than two minutes, a leader in his group cut him off to allow Marble to answer. Both the senator and the leader commended him for his “thorough” list of questions.

But after the meeting, the leader of Ames’ Cub Scout pack, which oversees various dens, requested a meeting with his mother. The leader told Ames’ mother, Lori Mayfield, that her son was kicked out of his Cub Scout den, the mother said in an email to the Washington Post.

The son’s den leader was apparently upset over Ames’ questions, particularly the one on gun control, Mayfield said. The mother was told her son’s question was disrespectful and too political.

“I had to go home and tell my son he was kicked out,” Mayfield said. “My son was heartbroken because he really liked this den leader and couldn’t understand why his question was inappropriate.”

Ames was less than four months away from transitioning from the Cub Scouts to the Boy Scouts, his mother said.

The Scouts did not explicitly say he was kicked out of the den. In a statement to the Post and local media outlets the Denver Area Council of the Boy Scouts said only that he remains a member of the larger pack, and that the organization is working with the family to offer him options that will “allow him to continue his Scouting experience in a way that fits his and his family’s needs.”

The Boy Scouts and the Denver Area Council are “committed to working with families interested in Scouting to find local units that are the best fit for their children,” the statement read.

Mayfield said she was told by the pack leader that Ames should not have brought up the topic of gun control, although Mayfield asserts the Scouts weren’t given any parameters before the meeting. She argued that other students’ questions were just as political.

Ames “has taken great interest in politics,” his mother said. The fifthgrader was so troubled by recent events that he ran for student council and executive council treasurer at his school. He won both.

This was her son’s fifth year in Cub Scouts. He has the top seller of his pack’s popcorn fundraiser, taking in $2,750 in just two weeks to pay for his dues and all of his activities for the rest of his time in Cub Scouts.

“Sadly, he will not get to reap the full benefit of his hard work,” his mother said.